Pathfinder Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous - Game of the Year Edition

[Desiderius]

It ends. But you can come back after getting Mythic 3 to clear stuff, with Demons like Blightmaw getting the -4 malus from the Sword of Valor.

 

[Max Damage]

I've finished Act 2 recently, looking forward to putting my newfound lich powers to good use. Feels kinda surreal to basically jump 4 levels ahead on spell progression so fast. Still a big improvement over Kingmaker, although army fights feel like afterthought.

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

Yeah I just killed Blightmaw and trying to fight Vhane.
Is he immune to grease? He doesn't even roll for it. I know the pit works though.

 

[Max Damage]

Yeah I just killed Blightmaw and trying to fight Vhane.
Is he immune to grease? He doesn't even roll for it. I know the pit works though.

I've loaded my save before the fight to check, and yeah, looks like immunity (Movement Impairing one, I guess, or the second Slow actually means Tripped)

 

[Desiderius]

Here's some pics I found. Maybe can give you some ideas since I'm not using anything fancy.

Looks like he's immune to Stagger so may be to Prone as well, although there'd be a save for that it would just say Immune after like with the Stagger. Since my MC was ranged I didn't use Grease last time through.

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

Well crap, that makes things a lot more difficult.
It doesn't help that Minago hits opens up with Waves of Exhaustion and then casts that putrefaction ability. Is it possible to kill her and then deal with Vhane? I'm pretty sure he can still drop down a hole.

 

[Average Manatee]

I'm not sure but I think you go to dialog when you hurt either of them to half health. After that

Spoiler

Minago flees and you're just left fighting Vhane. So if you spent your time hurting Vhane then you're already halfway done with the fight at that point but Minago is the softer target I believe so there's valid reasons to go for her first just to get her off the field quicker

 

[Max Damage]

It's a scripted fight, she leaves either way after you deal enough damage.

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

This is some poorly designed shit.
I managed to burst down minago and trapped Vhane in a pit. A cutscene plays. They put him right in the middle of my party. He then one shots my main character despite being buffed out.

How can he still deal that much damage and have that much health after Minago "took back what's hers"? Shouldn't he be weaker?
How the hell are you supposed to deal with that putrefaction ability?

Oh, and reducing Vhane to half health will make Minago disappear? Absolutely false, I managed to do it and the cutscene didn't play.

Edit : I finally did it.
I don't know how I did it, but I did it. I cast every buff I had again, except this time I got initiative and managed to burst Stanton down somehow. And yeah, you have to deplete ALL of his health for the cutscene to trigger, not half of it.
After the cutscene ended he just had one health left and Lann took it.

What a terribly designed encounter. Having a cutscene mid fight that moves everyone around isn't great. You absolutely have to alpha strike, or else Minago will screw you over with her spells.

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

I like how time doesn't automatically pass when you issue decrees like what happens in Kingmaker. That is such an improvement.

 

[Average Manatee]

Yeah. it'd be unplayable if that happened because you have to move armies and react to enemies on a daily basis.

Though that is one criticism I have, you need to check the map EVERY DAY. It'd be way better if you could save up like 3 days worth of movement. Kind of dumb that you can be in the middle of a dungeon, rest, and then the optimal strategy is to walk out of the dungeon to handle crusade shit and go back in. I know you don't technically need to do this but muh optimization.

 

[Desiderius]

How the hell are you supposed to deal with that putrefaction ability?

Start by reading it.



Nenio gets that spell at lvl 11. It's pretty good. Use it and see what it works against and doesn't and try to figure out why so you can use that to defend yourself.

That's what this game is about. If you don't like it this game isn't really for you. No bullshit involved.

Minagho is not the softer target BTW*. Burst Vhane down ASAP to get rid of her. The reset is a little clunky but no reason to get one shot, but sometimes you get unlucky and have to reload or use Raise Dead (or one of the insta-rezzes if you're quick). Not the end of the world.

* - you may want to try to interrupt her casting with damage in RTwP, but she has pretty high concentration. Probably not intended to beat her until you encounter her again later.

 

[Desiderius]

Yeah. it'd be unplayable if that happened because you have to move armies and react to enemies on a daily basis.

Though that is one criticism I have, you need to check the map EVERY DAY. It'd be way better if you could save up like 3 days worth of movement. Kind of dumb that you can be in the middle of a dungeon, rest, and then the optimal strategy is to walk out of the dungeon to handle crusade shit and go back in. I know you don't technically need to do this but muh optimization.

Unlike P:K time is on your side so hard to say whether that's optimal or not. But point taken. If you spend a week in a dungeon a wandering may be besieging a city when you come out.

 

[Average Manatee]

Unlike P:K time is on your side so hard to say whether that's optimal or not. But point taken. If you spend a week in a dungeon a wandering may be besieging a city when you come out.

True, you can mostly ignore time. In fact the "best" way to play probably involves sitting around in chapter 2 for a year gathering income. Spawning enemies also help level your general. But crusade mode is like a mini-HoMM and so I play it like HoMM, meaning conquering everything as fast as possible, spreading out scouts everywhere, getting to forts ASAP, etc etc.

Which incidentally reminds me of another problem with crusade mode: it's obvious that scouting with small armies is a part of the game, but if you choose a wrong path you can end up fighting an enemy army that immediately kills you. And some of those paths are like, you clicked to go north and you go that way for a while then turn around and go south and hit the army. So its basically unpredictable. Annoyingly it means a loading screen for the battle, then a loading screen back to the crusade map, then a loading screen to reload your save. You should be able to refuse to engage an enemy army when you walk into them on your turn. But ehh, minor quibbles.

 

[Mr. Magniloquent]

Well crap, that makes things a lot more difficult.
It doesn't help that Minago hits opens up with Waves of Exhaustion and then casts that putrefaction ability. Is it possible to kill her and then deal with Vhane? I'm pretty sure he can still drop down a hole.

Stauntion Vane has tons of immunities that cannot be dispelled. You also have to watchout because he can trigger an instantaneous double cast of Heal on himself. I don't know if my game is bugged, but going after Minhago didn't accomplish anything. She was invulnerable even at what appeared to be zero HP. I had to focus on Stauntion anyway because he bonanzas triple digit critical hits. I had the absolute worst time (luck?) with this fight.

 

[Average Manatee]

Does Surprise Spells from Arcane Trickster level 10 apply to only direct damage spells or also DoT spells (e.g. Sirocco)? I'm assuming the answer is "no" because that'd be hilariously overpowered and either mentioned constantly or fixed long ago, but just want to check.

EDIT: Also, this is dumb, but I gotta ask: anyone tested surprise spells with a Knife Master holding a dagger?

 

[Desiderius]

Stauntion Vane has tons of immunities that cannot be dispelled. You also have to watchout because he can trigger an instantaneous double cast of Heal on himself

Are you sure that's not just coming back after the cutscene? I've never seen him do this.

Here's his immunities:



Is immune to Poison, not immune to Prone:



Looks like Lightning could work too.

 

[Yosharian]

Meh I found that fight pretty easy, he does hit hard though

 

[Average Manatee]

Thought Staunton had way higher AC than that. Something like 40?

But then if you've been able to take the optional demon summoning fight you should still be able to 1-2 turn him.

 

[Haplo]

Meh I found that fight pretty easy, he does hit hard though

Well, he's relatively easy to burst down. But if you don't or make the mistake of focusing on Minagho... he can end you fast.
Minagho's spells, particularly Putrefaction, don't help.

 

[Rhobar121]

I've never had a problem with him, although I always prefers brute force tactics. Community + Madness domain win about 90% of the fights for me.

Instant Enemy and Hunter's Bond should work together?

 

[Haplo]

So what would you use to make the most out of Demonic Charge?
Seems like the most fun ability they have.

Yeah, I guess still Cleaving Finish Vital Strikes. Not really a meta build after the nerfs, though.

What did they nerf about them?

Vital Strike damage is no longer multiplied on crits.

Saving people from themselves again. Full attacks cost no Feats. Sux if you’ve got a good Move Action (like Freebooter’s Bane or Demon teleport) you want to pair with a single-target Standard Action, but that’s a pretty narrow case.

(Surprise) Charge followed up by Full Attack is still the bread-and-butter of the vast majority of classes (or simply firing Full Attax at range without having to move and hitting multiple targets after the first dies instead of simply overkilling one), and trying jam Vital Strike in everywhere has done people far more harm than good.

Full attacks don't chain with Cleaving Finish, so with Vital Strike you didn't really overkill, since you popped the next mob as well.

Besides, this isn't even about Vital Strike, but about who makes best use of Demonic Charge.

Vital Strike kind of wants parties built for it. Pairs very well with Sensei Mass True Strike advice.

Demonic Charge was more interesting when you could use it to teleport anywhere, as it was a nice mobility tool for casters then

 

[volklore]

Which actually gets me thinking. Slow works against Undead too, right?

Indeed.
Trouble is its difficult to get Transmutation DCs high.

As an alternative for Druids/Shamans there's also Conjuration Slowing Mud - Fortitude based.
Not that Conjuration DCs are that much better.

In act1/2 there isn't a really big difference in DC. Only DC items you get is a +1 will DC staff which works on slow, a +1 evocation DC dagger and a +2 illusion ring. The illusion ring is pretty whatever for most of act 2 (rainbow pattern is pretty good on gargoyles though). Undead is mostly an act 2 problem so transmutation or conjuration should pretty much be at full power there regardless of how they are itemized later. The difference becomes big when you open the drezen vendors and then Mind affecting spells skyrocket ahead of the rest (although I do not know what IE and Treasure DLC bring item wise since I do not own them)
And at worse there is expanded arsenal, even without the bug, this feat is massive - you can tech for the early game and transition in midgame to a better school. I find slow/conjurations the be the best options for most of act1/2, even though they are the least supported schools item wise later. In vanilla selective grease is a no brainer, and in TTT I find slow to be the most reliable. So I like taking focuses in conjuration or transmutation early game and going for expanded arsenal at M2 delaying Spell focus mythic for M4 which I rush in act3. Its not like those feats are wasted either because in a pinch you might want to target a weak reflex save or something, and with debuffs even weaker DCs can go through saves. And what I have noticed is that baleful polymorph isn't immuned by many things which makes it a good fall back when Mind affecting spells won't do the trick. It is also better supported than the rest of transmutation because it targets fortitude and there is at least one item that boost fort save dc.

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

Thought Staunton had way higher AC than that. Something like 40?

But then if you've been able to take the optional demon summoning fight you should still be able to 1-2 turn him.

Nah, his brother has 40 AC on core.
Staunton has about 28 but he deals a lot more damage and has a high BAB. He also has a lot of immunities.

I dunno, I don't think Blightmaw hits quite as hard or as accurately as Staunton, and he doesn't hit the party with aoe spells. He just has a lot of attacks and health.

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

Meh I found that fight pretty easy, he does hit hard though

Well, he's relatively easy to burst down. But if you don't or make the mistake of focusing on Minagho... he can end you fast.
Minagho's spells, particularly Putrefaction, don't help.

Even then, you need a bit of luck. If either of them get a turn you might as well reload. The cutscene reset really doesn't help.